He wond'ring views the bright enchantment bend,
Delightful, o'er the radiant fields, and runs
To catch the falling glory; but amaz'd
Beholds th' amusive arch before him fly,
Then vanish quite away. Still night succeeds,
A soften'd shade; and saturated earth
Awaits the morning beam, to give to light,
Rais'd through ten thousand diff'rent plastic tubes,
The balmy treasures of the former day.

Then spring the living herbs, profusely wild,
O'er all the deep-green earth, beyond the pow'r
Of botanist to number up their tribes:
Whether he steals along the lonely dale,

In silent search; or through the forest, rank
With what the dull incurious weeds account,
Bursts his blind way; or climbs the mountain-rock,
Fir'd by the nodding verdure of its brow:
With such a lib'ral hand has nature flung

Their seeds abroad, blown them about in winds,
Innum'rous mix'd them with the nursing mould,
The moist'ning current, and prolific rain.
But who their virtues can declare ? who pierce,
With vision pure, into these secret stores
Of health, and life, and joy? the food of man,
While yet he liv'd in innocence, and told
A length of golden years, unflesh'd in blood;
A stranger to the savage arts of life,
Death, rapine, carnage, surfeit, and disease;
The lord, and not the tyrant, of the world.

The first fresh dawn then wak'd the gladden'd race Of uncorrupted man, nor blush'd to see

The sluggard sleep beneath its sacred beam.
For their light slumbers gently fum'd away;
And up they rose, as vig'rous as the sun,
Or to the culture of the willing glebe,
Or to the cheerful tendance of the flock.
Meantime, the song went round; and dance, and sport,
Wisdom, and friendly talk, successive, stole

Their hours away. While in the rosy vale
Love breath'd his infant sighs from anguish free,
And full replete with bliss; save the sweet pain,
That, inly thrilling, but exalts it more.
Nor yet injurious act, nor surly deed,
Was known among those happy sons of heav'n,;
For reason and benevolence were law.
Harmonious nature, too, look'd smiling on.
Clear shone the skies, cool'd with eternal gales,
And balmy spirit all. The youthful sun
Shot his best rays; and still the gracious clouds
Dropp'd fatness down; as o'er the swelling mead
The herds and flocks, commixing, play'd secure.
This when, emergent from the gloomy wood,
The glaring lion saw, his horrid heart
Was meeken'd, and he join'd his sullen joy;
For music held the whole in perfect peace.
Soft sigh'd the flute: the tender voice was heard,
Warbling the varied heart: the woodlands round
Applied their quire; and winds and waters flow'd
In consonance. Such were those prime of days.
But now those white unblemish'd manners, whence
The fabling poets took their golden age,

Are found no more amid these iron times,

These dregs of life! Now the distemper'd mind
Has lost that concord of harmonious pow'rs
Which forms the soul of happiness; and all
Is off the poise within: the passions all
Have burst their bounds; and reason, half-extinct
Or impotent, or else approving, sees

The foul disorder. Senseless and deform'd,
Convulsive anger storms at large; or, pale
And silent, settles into fell revenge.
Base envy withers at another's joy,
And hates that excellence it cannot reach.
Desponding fear, of feeble fancies full,
Weak and unmanly, loosens ev'ry pow'r.
E'en love itself is bitterness of soul,
A pensive anguish, pining at the heart;
Or, sunk to sordid int'rests, feels no more
That noble wish, that never-cloy'd desire,
Which, selfish joy disdaining, seeks alone
To bless the dearer object of its flame.
Hope sickens with extravagance; and grief,
Of life impatient, into madness swells,
Or in dead silence wastes the weeping hours.
These, and a thousand mix'd emotions more,
From ever-changing views of good and ill
Form'd infinitely various, vex the mind

With endless storm; whence, deeply-rankling, grows
The partial thought, a listless unconcern,
Cold and averting from our neighbour's good;
Then dark disgust, and hatred, winding wiles,
Coward deceit, and ruffian violence.

At last, extinct each social feeling, fell

And joyless inhumanity pervades

And petrifies the heart. Nature, disturb'd,
Is deem'd, vindictive, to have chang'd her course.
Hence in old dusky time a deluge came;
When the deep-cleft disparting orb, that arch'd
The central waters round, impetuous rush'd,
With universal burst, into the gulf;

And o'er the high-pil'd hills of fractur'd earth
Wide dash'd the waves in undulation vast;
Till, from the centre to the streaming clouds,
A shoreless ocean tumbled round the globe.

The seasons since have, with severer sway, Oppress'd a broken world: the Winter keen Shook forth his waste of snows; and Summer shot His pestilential heats. Great Spring, before, Green'd all the year; and fruits and blossoms blush'd In social sweetness on the self-same bough. Pure was the temp'rate air: an even calm Perpetual reign'd, save what the zephyrs bland Breath'd o'er the blue expanse; for then nor storms Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage. Sound slept the waters: no sulphureous glooms Swell'd in the sky, and sent the lightning forth; While sickly damps, and cold autumnal fogs, Hung not, relaxing, on the springs of life. But now, of turbid elements the sport, From clear to cloudy toss'd, from hot to cold, And dry to moist, with inward-eating change, Our drooping days have dwindled down tonought; Their period finish'd ere 'tis well begun.

And yet the wholesome herb neglected dies;

Though with the pure, exhilarating soul
Of nutriment, and health, and vital pow'rs,
Beyond the search of art, 'tis copious blest.
For, with hot ravin fir'd, ensanguin'd man
Is now become the lion of the plain,

And worse. The wolf, who, from the nightly fold
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her milk
Nor wore her warming fleece; nor has the steer,
At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs,
E'er plough'd for him. They too, are temper'd high,
With hunger stung and wild necessity;

Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast.

But man, whom nature form'd of milder clay,
With ev'ry kind emotion in his heart,

And taught alone to weep; while from her lap
She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs,
And fruits, as num'rous as the drops of rain,

Or beams that gave them birth; shall he, fair form!
Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on heav'n,
E'en stoop to mingle with the prowling herd,
And dip his tongue in gore? The beast of prey,
Blood-stain'd, deserves to bleed; but you, ye flocks,
What have you done? ye peaceful people, what,
To merit death? you, who have giv'n us milk
In luscious streams, and lent us your own coat
Against the winter's cold. And the plain ox,
That harmless, honest, guileless animal,
In what has he offended? he whose toil,
Patient and ever ready, clothes the land
With all the pomp of harvest; shall he bleed,
And, struggling, groan beneath the cruel hands